In reply to the previous person who asked about Jigsaw and Mac:
The Sun JDK 1.0.2 for the Mac has a serious bug in the java.net.*
package, rendering it useless for server applications. This was
mentioned once on the home page for Jeeves when it was in its alpha
stage (explaining why only versions for Windows and Solaris were
available), but was mysteriously quickly removed. I imagine that if
Jeeves has a problem with Sun-Mac JDK 1.0.2, so will Jigsaw.
Anyone can confirm this by running a trivial Java server demo in any
Java book on a Mac Java 1.0.2 runtime (the Sun version). It chokes after
doing anything slightly more than trivial. How they could call this FCS
and let that slip through beta testing I have no idea. I'm sure the
reason Apple decided to make their own Java runtime is because they took
a look at what came out of Sun and said "Jeez! They're more incompetent
than the people that designed our [defunct] MacOS 8! We gotta get Java
working here (with or without Sun's help), or we're doomed!"
I do not know about other JVM's other than Sun. Another thing to keep in
mind is that the Sun and Apple versions of the 1.0.2 JVM can be up to 10
times slower than Windows/Solaris versions, depending on the benchmark
you look at and the version (JIT/no JIT) you look at.
Better pray that JavaSoft hired some competent people to do the Mac 1.1
version-- much more competent than the folks that did the 1.0.2 version.
The fact that the Win32, Solaris x86 and SPARC versions of 1.1.1 are
almost in sync, but Mac is still 6 months trailing (optimistic estimate)
is a BAD sign. Shows you that either Sun has different priorities, or
that there's a LOT of work/problems to be fixed. Strange that Sun bad
mouths Microsoft all the time, but manages to put out a good decent JVM
for it and on-time. Even does true threading, which their own Solaris
versions don't do yet (well, it's in pre-release now)
Then again, considering that Mac doesn't do threads, pre-emptive
multitasking, has a 31 character filename limitation, and the OS's new
networking system (OT 1.1.2) still has quite a ways to go (in terms of
reliability), I can understand why it takes longer.
--
Adrian Havill <http://www.threeweb.ad.jp/> Phone: +81 (06) 536-6731
System Planning & Production Division Fax: +81 (06) 536-6741